


angelfall

by leiascully



Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-08-07
Updated: 2005-08-07
Packaged: 2017-10-03 06:26:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leiascully/pseuds/leiascully
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Halloween at Hogwarts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	angelfall

**Author's Note:**

> Timeline: Hogwarts-era  
> A/N: This fermented in my head for a long time before I wrote it down. And I stole the title from a song by [**emhen**](http://emhen.livejournal.com/).   
> Disclaimer: _Harry Potter_ and all related characters are the property of JK Rowling and Scholastic. No profit is made from this work and no infringement is intended.

One Halloween, their sixth Halloween at Hogwarts, Sirius was an angel. He charmed the wings himself, enormous feathery things whose tips brushed the floor: a thousand quills stolen over the years, or recovered from Filch's cache, or bought with noble Black Galleons that jingled in deep robe pockets.

Help me, he said to Remus. You're the clever one, Moony, I'll use the sheet from my bed instead of bleaching my robes, but now how am I to get these things on my back?

They were the only two up: Remus liked a quiet solitary cup of tea in the common room of a morning and Sirius was willing to rise early for mischief or Halloween. It was a sacred day. Sirius had spread the wings carefully on the floor and smoothed all the feathers down. He knelt between the wings wearing black silk pajama bottoms, a marvel of barechested late adolescence. His pale skin glowed, and Remus, watching, did not notice that his teacup was burning his hand.

Moonymoony, said Sirius, you canny sod, how am I to wear them?

Sirius' shoulders were corded with muscle and his boyish body was slanting into adulthood, new planes and angles to replace the childish softness of abdomen and arm. His face too had lately lost the last baby roundness. Remus traced the lines of cheekbone and jaw with his eyes, caught the inquisitive arch of eyebrow, and put his teacup down.

Weightlessness, he said, and it was half a suggestion and half a revelation about how Sirius made him feel. We'll charm them weightless, Padfoot, and then use a Sticking Charm to affix them to your back.

Brilliant, said Sirius. He rose, tall and elegant, and moved toward Remus. He shucked out of his pajamas: Sirius Black had nothing to be ashamed of. He wore boxers the way he wore dress robes, with the same innate confidence in his looks. Help me wrap the sheet, Remus, and then I'll tell you where I want them on.

And so Remus, trembling, tucked and folded and tried not to let his fingers touch Sirius too much. He scratched Sirius once by accident and left a thin red streak across one fine pectoral.

Sorry, he whispered.

We match, said Sirius, drawing his finger down the front of Remus' jumper with an uncanny memory of just how the scar ran. Remus shivered.

Yours will go away, he said. Sirius' eyes softened.

Here, he said, turning and presenting Remus with the jut of his shoulder blades. He twisted a little to put Remus' palm on his back. Stick it here. No, don't take your hand away, Moony, you'll forget.

Remus charmed the wings weightless and sticky with one palm flattened against Sirius' back and a helpless flood of words building at the back of his throat. In silence he secured the wings to Sirius - one, two, neat as anything - and stepped away.

Sirius turned and the rising sun wafted high enough to glow through the old uneven glass of the tower window. Remus had never seen anything so beautiful in his life: Sirius with his grey eyes full of light and his dark hair falling softly around his face. The drape of the sheet, which Remus had thought clumsy, transformed Sirius' haughty aristocratic posture into an expression of impossible grace and wisdom. The oblique dawn light slanted down Sirius' cheeks: he seemed to belong to some unearthly race, the man's bone structure just visible through the boy's fine skin. With his perfectly innocent expression, he was preternaturally lovely, and Remus almost cried.

Dogstar, Morningstar, Sirius said affably, not much difference in the end. But soft, what light is this? He seemed to have caught the glimmer of water in Remus' eyes, and he passed the pad of his thumb over the dark circles under Remus' eyes.

Don't worry, Moony lad, we'll make you a costume just as nice, he promised. He kissed Remus' forehead.

Remus, startled, clutched at something for support, which turned out to be Sirius' forearm. That isn't it, he said. I don't know why I'm crying.

Angel kisses heal all wounds, said Sirius with a sweet look in his eyes.

Remus wanted to believe. He turned up his face to receive the blessing.


End file.
